Liberty is Intrinsic to the Divine

“It is by God’s own will that we get to choose our own fate. He has given us the rules, now it is up to us to win the game.” - L

There are a lot of ideas within the humanist and liberal movement that I feel are intelligent in design. They lack the humbleness of the saints (at least what God had hoped for us), but can not be completely denied based solely on this one argument. The humanist view that truth and morality is sought through human investigation; as such, views on morality can change when new knowledge and information is discovered and the liberal belief of self-determination in human existence are both divine in nature.

I am not certain that morality can change. However, I think it is very apparent that our view and understanding of morality can deepen. The Old Testament laid out a set of laws and rules to follow to a very naive and ignorant society. As they progressed (for better or for worse) so did their understanding of right and wrong. In the New Testament God defined these laws in a different light. He told us if we love one another and treat each other well and hold God as the most high, then we could not disregard the law, henceforth they are one and the same (not different, just more complex). As our understanding of sin and morality increased and became more complicated in nature, so did God’s commandments to us. The church of antiquity (and America less than fifty years ago) thought it was okay to suppress and belittle women, propagate racism, and indulge in king worship (theocracy or papacy), by today’s standards that is immoral. More evidence that we as a body of believers can better define the nuances of moral questions as they become more complex and we become more mature as a people.

While the liberal and humanist reliance on self-worth is extravagant to say the least, as a religious man I do believe in self determination. Many intellectuals from the Enlightenment, including those most influential in creating our country; George Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Ben Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay and many more, believed that individual liberty was not only humanly moral, but a God given entitlement presented to us and proven in His own actions in our history. God gave us a choice. This is never more apparent than in our freedom to worship. If the divine creator of all that exists insisted that we believe and worship faithfully, than we would. The fact that we all do not can be most apparent when believers at times exhibit extreme lapses in judgment and morals. Therefore, I can not understand why the church feels the necessity to propagate and espouse its moral authority upon the rest of the world (or at least our country). If God gave individuals the freedom to choose, how could we rationalize otherwise? Perhaps we as the body of Christ suffer from a form of narcissism or at the very least delusions of grandeur. We should not choose to destroy that which God has created and self determination is ever apparent from Adam and Eve to Revelation.

Intellectual progress is what God wanted for us. Reason, understanding and rational inspection of self evident truths can be seen from the writings of Moses to John. It is our nature and duty to progress; this is why we are not saved from birth. Liberty and free will are an essential part of life on this planet. We might not like the choices that others make but God did not intend for us to stand in between another man’s intellect and his actions. We choose and suffer the consequences of our action, God does not choose for us. He gives us the knowledge to succeed and we choose to listen or deny. It is our commission as saints to provide the information necessary to present the steps of salvation to the world, God never gave us permission to oppress those that choose otherwise.

Sleep

Here I am, in the mirror face to face

All I see is dreary darkness; I think I know my fate.

One more time I’ve really failed in haste

Perhaps before I die I’ll finally know my place.

I continually look to God to recognize his grace

How could I be a worse person than I am today?

I don’t deserve anything; I’m consumed by my own hate

I create my own motivation; it gets in the way of my fate.

Before my life ends, I’ll be sure to make amends

To return this world to the usefulness it possessed before my life began.

I pray for serenity so that I might feel comfortable just getting by,

But I know in the end, I’m really just wasting time.

I’m inconsequential, because I’m lacking motivation

Please God just let me understand my Christ driven faith and

Why you put me hear to suffer all these nights?

Insomnia is my friend like a head of hair full of lice.

Before I die my redemption song will sing so very loud

Bob Marley and the Whalers could never be so proud

If God is by my side he’ll see me as a sheep

With Him in my pasture I’ll finally get some sleep.

Perhaps some day before I die, I’ll finally know my place

I hate being fifth in a five man race.

After I get some sleep I’ll begin my day anew

I’ll finally begin to live my life not for me, but for You.

The Motives of Men

I am a religious man. My Christian faith defines who I am more than any other aspect of my character. I don’t believe that the church is inherently evil or destructive in nature; however I do believe that men are inherently evil and destructive and history proves this time and time again. I also believe that following the church blindly, with out raising questions of its power, its doctrine and its intent can in itself be damaging not only to the Church, but to the power of the Gospel in a fallen world. Without introspection of the agenda of our leadership, whether secular or religious, tyranny will always rule. There are many examples of political power grabs by the Church that in retrospect can be seen as absurd abuses of powers. These influential leaders used the Word and our faith in the sanctity of our ecclesiastical mentors and leaders, to gain power.

The nine Crusades were fought to protect the world against heretics and pagans alike, they were aimed at Islam, pagan Slavs, Jews, Russian and Greek Orthodox Christians, Mongols, Cathars, Hussites, Waldensians, Old Prussians, and other political enemies of the Popes’. Crusaders took vows and were granted penance for past sins, also known as indulgences. The motto of these endeavors was, “if God does not believe in our war than we will lose.” Guess what? We (the church, not us) lost. Roger Bacon, an English philosopher and Franciscan friar was an outspoken critic of these wars and he emphatically stated, “The Crusades were not effective because, those who survive, together with their children, are more and more embittered against the Christian faith," also "High ideals were besmirched by cruelty and greed … the Holy War was nothing more than a long act of intolerance in the name of God" Do you know what happened to him? He was excommunicated, not allowed to write, removed from his teaching position at Oxford, and placed under house arrest until the day that he died.

The four Inquisitions were propagated by Church leadership to weed out divisive figures within the Church body (heretics). How was this done? Torture and execution! There objective was to cleanse the Church of those who sought to divide it, by any means necessary. By Inquisition standards, mind you, my church and most of those in my community are full of heretics. Don’t get me wrong, a lot of good came from these trials. For instance, most methods of modern torture used by Saudi Arabia, Israel, most Islamic theocratic nations, the Chinese, the Russians, oh yeah we can’t forget about the United States of America (at least for the last 4 years), were invented and perfected during different periods of the Inquisition. Unfortunately, dissenters that spoke out were put to death, largely propagating a silent yet disagreeable disobedience. For instance Galileo Galilei was put under house arrest and forbidden to ever write again due to his crazy idea that the Earth revolved around the Sun. He was a Christian.

The corruption of the Roman Catholic Church was not challenged until the rebellious, and at the time, heretical doctrines brought to light by Martin Luther. The Salem Witch Trials were seen as a service towards Gods people to protect themselves from the evil forces of the Enemy in a country founded on Christian beliefs and values. And we must never forget the worst mistake we have made in the Churches short history; the Moral Majority’s, support for Jimmy Carter over Gerald Ford in the 1976 Presidential election, something that the Church may never live down (at least as long as I am alive.)

These are all very real and very telling examples of movements by the Church, largely unchallenged by its leadership or the congregations that blindly followed them without question. Was their motive power? Sometimes. Was their motive to save the world from its inherent immorality? Sometimes. They appealed to the Church body by choosing to quote scripture and historical figures that supported their ideas, and highlighted our desire to be righteous in the Lords sight, while disregarding statements by both the Word and the people they were quoting; this is both nonsensical and dishonest. In my religious training I was taught that the difference between good theology and bad theology was that good theology takes the entire context of the Bible into account and is void of contradiction. Bad theology simply takes verses and uses them to support one’s personal belief, regardless of how it conflicts with other statements in the Word.

What is our purpose on this planet? What is our purpose as a nation under God? What is our purpose as Saints? God gave us one very simple yet life consuming task (which came directly from Him) and that supersedes all others later constructed by man, “…you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

Are we a Christian Nation, blessed by the power of God and chosen to not only spread the Word, but also to force the laws of Moses and the Ten Commandments on all that don’t believe? Would Jesus be proud of us as His body of believers, to sit in tyrannical judgment over those who disagree with his teachings? If indeed God gave us the freedom to choose life or death, who are we to take away from those who choose that which we have not? God gave us “free will” taking that away from someone is a clear breach of the 2^nd Commandment, “You shall have no other gods before me.” And the 3^rd Commandment, “You shall not make for yourself and idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below…” If you place yourself in the judgment seat of God, idolatry is your sin. If God feels that it is our holy duty to subject non-believers to his laws, than why wouldn’t He do it Himself? He is all powerful and our influence is finite.

We don’t have to protect Christ from the pagans of the world; we have to show the pagans of the world the love of Christ, through His words and through our works, just as he did for us. Sometimes a little dissent is healthy, if for only the reason that it may slow down a movement long enough to be certain that it is truly ordained by the Lord. When we rely on the ideas and motives of men, we forget that we are the reason this place called Earth is so messed up to begin with. Whether I am right or wrong one thing certain, judgment will come in the end, but not in this day.